The Abilene reflector. [volume] (Abilene, Kan.) 1883-1888, 1887-04-28
FOREIGN SPECTATORS.


The Policy OF the Land Omce Has Been
| Not to Discourage European Capital
But tn Force Capitalists Abroad 50 In.
vest 1t Honestly.
| Certain American citizens who
crossed the Atlantic not long ago with
the intention of selling in England or
Holland great slices of unimproved
land in our Territories have been
brought up with round turn by the
passage of the so-called Alien Land
lords act. One of them was ex-Sena-
tor Stephen W. Dorsey. who is said to
have had several millions of acres to
! sell, and whose elaborate dinners in
London, have attracted the attention of
the Associated Press. Other Ameri-
cans have been offering to foreign in
vestors trifle of $4,000, 600 acres Cor
two and One-haf times the area of the
State of New York; situated some
where in the wonderful Southwest,
where enormous ranches and bound
less Spanish grants grow from nothing
in single night. But the foreigners
ardor has suddenly been chilled and
the American spectators have been
discouraged by the news that the
United States Government proposes to
keep the land for American citizens.
Our London correspondent says that
the English will not buy. They dis
play much anxiety concerning invest
ments heretofore made in American
lands and will take no more risks.
The largest company of negotiating
agents in Europe has resolved that it
will no longer deal in our Territorial
lands or securities. The act of Con-
gress that has so fiattened out the
market for American grants and
ranches has been cabled to South
Africa, and probably to other col
Onies, to make boom in real estate
there, upon the assumption that the
stream of English capital will be di-
verted from American grazing dis
tricts to lands under the protection of
British laws.
Possibly the Englishmen will not
suffer by reason of this new law. Ow-
ing to the activity of our General Land
Office the detection of almost innumer-
able cases of fraud on our public lands
promises to unsettle the titles" of
some vast estates built up by fraudu-
lent entry. Even if the Alien Land
lords act were not on the statute book
the purchase of some of these expanded
grants and ranches might be a profit
less transaction. Even ex-senator Dor
sey's great ranch has been shorn of
some of its outlying principalities.
At the command of the President
he has taken down fifty miles of fence
by which he had inclosed great tract
to which he had no title. The expanded
Maxwell grant, so well known in Hol-
land, is still in the courts. Federal
officers are reporting every week eX-
panded Spanish grants for reclamation.
The large investment made by Scottish
capitalists in Humboldt County, Cal,
is in danger, because the lands in ques-
ton were obtained by the boldest
fraud, and the Government is prose-
cutting the thieves with the purpose of
furnishing them and recovering the
plumber.
Congress has very properly under
taken to prevent the establishment of
the landlord and tenant system of
Great Britain in our Territories. Too
many large tracts of land in the far
West are already held by English
peers. 1t was intended by those who
made our laws for the distribution
of public land that the land should
90 into the hands of actual settlers
in small parcels. Their purpose has
been. defeated in thousands of cases
by fraud. Possibly the Alien Landlord
bill would not have been passed if the
tracts now held by foreign capitalists
had not been procured fraudulently.
These capitalists or their agents have
induced unscrupuloGs citizens to COM
NIT the frauds by which their estates
have been created. or they have bought
the estates from citizens who fraudu-
lantly took them from the public do
main.
We have land thieves enough of our
own, and they are sufficiently active,
even when they are not stimulated by
the use of foreign capital. The Gov
ernment is now striving, in the face of
great obstacles, to preserve for actual
settlors the remnant of our public lands
that has not been taken by syndicates
and spectators. These lands are
needed for the use of small farmers.
Foreign investors should understand
that the American people do not de-
sire to shut out European capital. but
propose that it shall be invested, if in
vested at all, honestly and in accord
ance with the spirit of our institutions.
They are not willing that it shall be
used to support those who steal public
land or for the establishment of vast
estates upon which Americen citizens
can live only as the tenants of foreign |
owner-N y. Times.
WANT tn SLAVE Linn